16-29 February 2016 Cyber Attacks Timeline

I know I was quite late with the timelines in the last period: I am trying to catch up as quickly as I can, and now it’s time to publish the second Cyber Attacks Timeline of February (first part here).

So it turned out that not even the Linux Distributions are immune from hackers: Linux Mint, the most popular flavor of the Open Source OS was the most important target of this fortnight: not only the forum has been hacked (and the details of 70,000 users leaked), but also the website was compromised to redirect the users to download a modified ISO with an embedded backdoor.

Another particularly devastating event (which curiously did not find too mach space in the media) hit Media1.com, a dating site, whose 27 million accounts were allegedly stolen and sold.

The Hacktivists were also quite active, especially in Italy where the Anonymous released 120,000 records from a local provider. Moreover this month has seen the comeback of the infamous collective TeaMp0isoN (or at least someone else using that name as at least two members have been possibly arrested).

Last but not least, a complex long-lasting cyber espionage operation against Japan has been revealed (Operation Dust Storm), and the US Secretary of Defense has admitted once and for all, that a cyber-offensive is currently ongoing to “interrupt [and] disrupt ISIL’s command and control”.

If you want to have an idea of how fragile our electronic identity is inside the cyberspace, have a look at the timelines of the main Cyber Attacks in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014,2015 and, in a bit, 2016 (regularly updated). You may also want to have a look at the Cyber Attack Statistics that are regularly published, and follow @paulsparrows on Twitter for the latest updates.

Also, feel free to submit remarkable incidents that in your opinion deserve to be included in the timelines (and charts).

Additionally, if you want, you can access the timeline in Google Sheet format: